What you are looking at is a map based loosely on the War of the Triple Alliance, South America's bloodiest war, which cost around 300,000 lives between the years 1864 - 1870. The balance of power shifted in the region, borders were forever redrawn, and Paraguay lost over half of its pre-war population. I say based "loosely" because not all of the land portrayed here saw action, but all of these regions were players in the war... Argentina, the southern half of Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay, and the disputer region called the Gran Chaco.

What you need to know: • territories: 52• bonus regions: 9... tentative bonuses are in the legend, and are more or less settled, though further discussion is never discouraged.• impassables: rivers and mountains, with two river crossings, one of which is one-way.• gameplay: classic all the way; the only oddity is the Rio de la Plata territory which is a river that can attack, and be attacked by, the capitals - as noted in the legend.• starting neutrals: none• image size: large 800x800, small 600x600• development plan: I do everything

I gotta say, tho, oak, that any of the other maps you've been working on seem more appealing than this one. Call me crazy, but it seems too much like the existing south america map, minus some bits in the south and northwest.

I'm sure it'll look cool, but unless you're planning on some sort of badass gameplay tweak, it just seems redundant.

But thank you oaktown for leaving brazil as is. I don't know why I have such an emotional tie to it - perhaps because it was my fav map when I joined. Regardless - this project looks way more appealing to me. Good Start. I'm psyched!

"Damn, oaktown, those ugly mountains again?"No, I won't be using them - just wanted to show where mountains should be.

"More territories! More territories!"I agree - I'd like to get it up and over 50. My hope is to come up with something similar to, though not a straight revamp of, the Brazil map. Where do you think we should add territories?

I'm not a fan of diamentina - the territory within a territory. But I'm liking the feel so far. Add territs all over the place. You'll have to reduce your font size though. The mountains - however crude, don't look that bad ?

What's new here: up to 55 territories, which is good for everything but two/three players, but with that many territories I'm not sure any number is going to be great for 3 player games. 57 would be better, and would mean fewer neutrals in other size games.

Added Rio de Plata as a river region, attackable via the capitals (which are, conveniently, also ports in this map's case). This is a good add in my opinion, since that region and it's sea access is what they were all fighting over to begin with.

Still haven't done any graphics work on this... later.

Crap - I also intend to have an Amazon crossing in the north somewhere but I keep forgetting to add it.

I'm generally unfamiliar with this war. Could you provide a summary of main events?

But really, maybe the small addition of something similar to the Dust Bowl explanation RJ provided on his map, might be in order.

I like the general look of the map (I suppose I prefer this style of graphics over L.A.), though the heavy green tones on the top clash a little with the bottom colors perhaps.

What is the justification behind the Rio de la Plata? I understand it is where the two rivers meet up, it seems almost like a random addition (and it also feels like Paraguay's capital would be safe from such attacks due to it being further inland!).

Hm, how much of this war went on in the North of Brazil? If little battle went on, it may be worthwhile to just cut off some of the top, enlarge the southern area of contention (where all the countries meet). But like I mentioned, I'm pretty unfamiliar with the war.

Perhaps an idea to include, or use somehow...mark major battles that occurred during the war. I'm not exactly sure what they'd do, if anything at all (maybe just decorative graphics), but a random idea.

Also, as I gather from the title...it was 3 vs 1, country wise. If you add a description (and perhaps even if you don't) explain mention the sides. If you don't add a description, perhaps just order the countries similar to: Name, Name, Name V.S. Name.

If you can make the contrast between the water and land a little stronger that would be good.

Looking at the map I like the capitals attack idea via rio de plata. It helps with the potential for bottlenecking down south. Otherwise Uruguay would be a huge problem.

The northern Amazon seems too easy to cut off and isolate. It has multiple points where access can be blocked with only 2 points of defense. I would recommend working in a third. The drop is less likely to spoil games on maps where parts of the map have 3 or more points of contact/infiltration/defense.

seamusk wrote:The northern Amazon seems too easy to cut off and isolate. It has multiple points where access can be blocked with only 2 points of defense.

Hmm, I see what you mean - from the Barra do Rio Negro territory it is an easy, terit by terit march through Alto and Rio Maeira. Geogaphically I'm not what to do about that given the current region configurations.

I think what I may end up doing is flipping the regions so that instead of having North and South Amazons I have Upper and Lower Amazons. This actually makes more sense geographically, and it means Upper is four territories (RIo Mad, Alto, Barra, Branca) with two borders, just as it is now, and lower is an easier to hold six territories with three borders.

As for Andy's comments:• I'll create a text box with background of the war... this sounds like fun anyway. • The colors will be pushed to look more faded and pastelish.• Rio de la Plata is key to the war, as Paraguay was landlocked and trying to control its sea access... I'll note that in the text box.• The north of Brazil had little involvement in the war, but this project was born from my attempt to re-imagine a Brazil map, so there it is. (Shhhh!)• Battles... I'll think on it, but I'm tentative because a) the territories in which most of the action took place are already small and crowded, and b) extraneous images on CC maps just lead to gameplay confusion.